Recipe Finder: Peel adds flavor to tomato marmalade

Jane Spencer of Baltimore is seeking a recipe for tomato marmalade. She writes, "It is a specialty of a gourmet friend but has been lost to us now for 10 years."

Lorraine Van Drimmelen of Salem, Ore., responded with the recipe.

Tomato Marmalade

3 lbs. tomatoes

1 orange

1/2 lemon

11/2 lbs. sugar

2 cups raisins (optional)

2 cups chopped walnuts (optional)

Dice tomatoes. Cut orange and lemon into very thin slices, discarding seeds. Add tomatoes, orange, lemon, sugar and optional raisins to large saucepan and cook over low heat, slowly, 3 hours. Stir often so the bottom doesn't burn. Add walnuts, if desired. Spoon hot mixture into six (6-ounce) canning jars that have been sterilized according to manufacturer's instructions. Top with metal caps and rings, and process in hot-water bath to seal.

Makes 6 jars.

Tester Laura Reiley's comments: "I would be inclined to peel and seed the tomatoes before chopping them. Slash a quick X in the skin of each tomato and drop them in boiling water for 16 seconds, then plunge them in an ice-water bath. The skins should slip right off. Then cut the tomatoes in half and scoop out the seeds with your fingers.

But, don't peel the fruit. The peel adds a little texture and marmalade-like bitterness to the finished preserves, as well as pretty swirls of color in the deep jewel-tone red jars. I think three hours is a little too long to cook the mixture. Mine was sweet, translucent and marmaladey after about two hours."